SF is Right Wing?

I have never been a huge science fiction fan. I know that sounds weird coming from a guy who grew up reading tons of science fiction anthologies and magazines and novels. But it never made up a large percentage of what I consumed. Perhaps five percent of the fiction I was reading for most of my life has been sf.

In the past decade or so I began to read more of it. Again, it still was not making up a majority of what I was reading, but I had been picking up science fiction novels and anthologies more than in my youth.

And I was struck by something:

A lot of the science fiction I was reading, (and a lot of the science fiction fans I was meeting), are politically right wing. I'm not talking just a tad to the right. I mean full-on Libertarian Fascism. With the exception of Richard K. Morgan, most of the speculative fiction I was discovering is, it seems, being written by people with right wing extremist motives and sympathies.

Has this always been the case?

Yes, I know that shit-hole Robert Heinlein has always been a darling of sf fandom. And I used to encounter right wing creeps on most of the sf-oriented chatrooms back in the early days of the Internet.  For instance, when I tried to interact with Bradbury fans to get information I needed for a project I discovered that they were almost all politically to the right and eager to bombard the Internet with their poisonous dogma. (This should not have surprised me terribly because I already knew that Bradbury had obviously gone from a politically progressive young man to a right wing shithead by his later years.)

But is the majority of the modern science fiction literary scene infected with right wing mania?

I do know that I have quickly grown sick of trying to read these Libertarian/religious/Objectivist/Fascist screeds in the form of science fiction novels and stories. I've reached a point where I'm prepared to swear it all off and go back to reading non-fiction to get away from the endless drone of science-fiction's neo-Fascist themes.

Alas!

Is all modern SF nothing but Fascistic shite?

Break This! (Second in a series.)

Years ago, discussing the slimiest sort of people that I have ever collectively encountered--Libertarians--one of my online pals took issue. He told me that he admired many Libertarians and that he was "proud to have broke bread (sic) with them".

I absolutely hate that kind of use of a term. Ignoring the fact that it came from an idiot and that he was quite happy associating with neo-Fascists, it's just an annoying bit of poorly understood language.

What the fuck did he mean?

I reckon what he meant was that he had either been invited to dine with some right wing assholes and had accepted the invitation, or that he had invited some right wing assholes to dine at his home and that they had accepted his invitation. Or, perhaps, they had met at a mutually agreeable neutral location where assholea go to eat a meal together.

So much for "broke bread".

It's one of the single most annoying uses of a commonly repeated saying that I regularly encounter. The dickwad using it generally thinks that it imparts some kind of intellectual weight to his comments. In fact, though, it alerts me to the fact that I'm listening to the yodeling of an idiot. If what he meant to say is that he had lots of friends who are right wing assholes, then why didn't he just say so? Admission that he was proud of the fact that he mingled freely with neo-Fascists and racists and pro-corporate stooges. That's a lot better than saying that he was "proud to have broke (sic) bread" with such human stench.

So shove your "broke bread" up your conservative asshole and try to speak like a normal human being.

Thanks for your attention to this issue.

(Moron on a Segway)
and second in a continuing series of instructional posts.

Goodbye to All That

I'm trying to finish up a zombie trilogy I contracted to write. I've enjoyed myself and it's some of the best writing I've ever done. But after this...I'm done with zombies. Most of the zombie books I encounter are political tracts for gun-crazed right wing racist maddies--that seems to be the audience for these books. Quite frankly, there's not a whole hell of a lot of difference between your average zombie novel and THE TURNER DIARIES. So, after this, I'm done with the zombie fiction ghetto.

I've talked about this subject before and took quite a lot of heat for it. I've only ever deleted a few comments to this website, and those were all racist screeds and personal threats I received for writing about how most zombie fiction is right wing and racist, or at least particularly appeals to that crowd.

So, after I finish these stories, I'm going to avoid the zombie apocalypse as a subject for my fiction. It was fun for a while, but it's obvious to me where it ended up and I don't want to work in that little subset of horror fiction any longer. As with most of the self-published books I see, I don't want to be associated with most of the zombie novels I've read. There are some genuinely creepy folk walking around in that field.

Talk about your mindless, undead monsters ready to kill and eat you...

 A pair of racist gun-crazed fuckwads.

Politics and Creative Folk

Sometimes I make a point of trying to avoid the political, religious, and philosophical beliefs of some of my favorite writers and artists. Often I find that creators whose work I had long admired are--politically and philosophically speaking--assholes.

Thus it is with one of my favorite comic book artists Chester Brown. For many years I have admired his work as an independent writer/artist. I supported his comic YUMMY FUR during the months when the book was being attacked and boycotted by an overbearing comic book distributor who is now (happily for me) bankrupt.

Sample art from what is my favorite Chester Brown comic series, Louis Riel, a biography of the Metis revolutionary Louis Riel. (A man who has far more in common with Che Guevara than with any Libertarian scum.)

His work is not only impossible to categorize, but it is almost impossible to describe. It's part fantasy, part autobiography, part biography. It is always thought-provoking and overwhelmingly unique and interesting.

Regular readers of my blog know that I absolutely hate Libertarians. I've never met one that I like and I find their political goals to be completely harmful to society and to almost every individual. I have absolutely no respect on either an intellectual basis or a moral basis for anyone who proclaims to be a Libertarian. (I must make it clear that "Libertarian" does not mean the ACLU which, as a civil liberties proponent protects us all from the shite who compose the various Libertarian parties working to destroy society for corporate power.)

And so it was with shock and disgust that I read that not only is Chester Brown a Libertarian, but that he stands in as a candidate for elective office as a member of the Libertarian Party of Canada. Fortunately he has never finished higher than next-to-last place in any race, and I hope this track record continues.


Will this knowledge that he's part of a wholly evil and destructive political party influence my appreciation of his work? I hope not, but there will always be the subconscious knowledge that he holds as dear thoughts and ideas that I find to be completely and utterly noxious. However, I think that I can still seek out and enjoy his books. As with his like-minded fellow travelers of the extreme right--folk such as Peter Bagge and Steve Ditko--I'll still read and view and enjoy his creations, despite the fact that I find his views to be execrate.



On becoming a whore-hopper.

His latest autobiographic work on deciding to frequent prostitutes.

The Troops Come Out, Life Immitates Art

Honoring the Fighting Men:

From 1962 to 2010. Once it was obvious hate speech, now it's considered legitimate politics from Tea Party/Republicans/Libertarians.

Glenn Beck, Bill O'Reilly, Fox News, etc. have gone back to the Klan's playbook. To Hell with the lot of them:

Rand Paul is a Sack of Shit

And here's a particularly huge bastard, Rand Paul, pining for the days when it was okay to be a racist shithead. The people of Kentucky are dumber than they look.

Rand Paul: Officially a sack of shit.

I mean, totally FUCK YOU, RAND PAUL! You lousy, stinking, worthless, pro-corporate, racist bag of buzzard puke! Fuck you and your stinking goddamned stupid shithead Libertarian father, too!

Take your so-called apology and change of mind about being a racist fuckhead and jam it up your asshole, you shit-smeared, scum-crawling, vomit-eating pig.

Death to the BP executives. Take care of them with a type of "top kill". It involves shooting lead bits into them through steel tubes.

Racist Arizona

Arizona has recently enacted a racist law. I'm not going to go into particulars. If it goose-steps like a Nazi and screams like a Klansman, it's racist.

Some people are calling for a boycott of Arizona.

Let's go them one better. Visit Arizona. But don't drive there. Walk there. Hike into the National Forests with your backpack and food and camping equipment (that you bought somewhere else). Sleep in our Arizona National Forests. You can generally use back country campsites for free. Don't even buy water. Take a water filter and purify your own water. Enjoy the beautiful sights of Arizona parklands. Buy nothing. Piss on their ground. Shit in their forests. Purchase nada while you're there, but leave some turds behind (responsibly buried away from streams and other water sources, of course).

Give them what they deserve: crap.

Visit Beautiful Arizona, and shit on 'em.

Libert-Aryans are Good for Something!

I'll be damned. Libertarians are actually good for something! And here I'd thought that the lot of them were a waste of space and oxygen!


Apparently, these filthy bastards, when running for office, siphon off some of the RepubliKKKan votes that would normally go to that Party. We all know that Libert-Aryans and RepubliKKKans share a common thread of complete and utter greed in their veins. Racism and personal entitlement also go hand in hand with these filthy greedbags. So it's no surprise, I reckon, that when a Libert-Aryan can generate enough funds to run a semi-effective campaign, that candidate peels off votes that would normally have gone to the RepubliKKKan who would generally appeal to a certain (racist/greedy) segment of the voters.


Witness the Libert-Aryan candidate siphoning off votes in Ohio, Georgia, and Minnesota. These particular scumbags carved off enough votes to either give the Democratic Party candidates the election, or at least turned the race into runoffs and recounts. (And, yes, I realize that the Independence Party of Minnesota isn't the official Libertarian Party, but they're carbon copies and attract the same type of slime.)


So, thanks, Libert-Aryans! You crazy, filthy bastards aren't quite the waste of food and air that I had thought!

A bunch of Libert-Aryan scumbags ! That same old same old RepubliKKKan bullshit! LOL!

Please put this war criminal on trial!

Indie Comic book creators: Crazy Motherfuckers.

In my day I have known a few indie comic book creators. Some of these guys (all of the comic book creators I’ve ever known were male) were sometimes brilliant, sometimes talented, sometimes stupid, and in almost every case (to quote myself) as crazy as a shark in a tub of blood.

Weirdly, the worst of these creator folk were virulently racist. Some of them didn’t even realize that they were (or are) virulently racist. Ask them, and they would likely tell you that they are quite fair-minded fellows with no racial or cultural prejudices whatsoever. But I’ve witnessed quite differently.

One of these kooks I used to visit often when I’d be in his town. We would discuss World War II history and have a good time. He was amusing and fun to hang around with. However, he mistook my interest in the European Theater of WWII for a certain sympathy for the Nazi regime and let slip some of his own thoughts. I was appalled and, he seeing the shock and horror on my face, quickly changed the subject. A few weeks later, talking to another comic artist who lived in the same city, I was informed that the very funny guy was, in fact, a closet Nazi with good friends involved in various racist groups. Of course I never went back to his house.

This guy had not known that my mom was half-Jewish and that I had nothing but pure hatred in my heart for racists in general and Nazis in particular.

Some time later another comic artist with whom I’d collaborated went to work with the closet case. When my sometime collaborator returned, he was packed to the gills with various racist and Nazi philosophies that he’d picked up while working there. Again, this guy didn’t know that my grandfather had been a Jew, that I loathed racism, and that I had no time for this shit.

When I ran comic book shops and comic book conventions I would have occasion to fly in various comic book artist/writers for autograph sessions. One of these guys would really take advantage of my status as host and would intentionally search out the most expensive things on the menu when we’d take him out to eat. Not that he particularly liked the most expensive thing on the menu, but he’d order them because they were the most expensive things on the menu. He would blab constantly. And, being a good host, I’d listen. (I quickly learned that most of these fellows really enjoyed listening to themselves talk.) Over the years I had him as a guest several times, and he was sometimes amusing, always expensive, but he seemed popular with the fans. Until, of course, his book’s sales plummeted. He was, perhaps not ignorantly, pals with the closet Nazi. In later years, this dude seemed to go completely insane and vent some of the most outrageous hatred toward the most powerless portion of this planet’s population. One reason I came to loathe Libertarians and all of their fellow travelers was because of this particular specimen of human filth.

In the past two years, having some time and money to expend on computers and broadband access to the Internet, I began to read the blog of one artist who’d always intrigued me. The guy’s work—both in collaboration with others, and on his own—was always sharp. So I started reading his almost-daily column. One day, reading it, he mentioned that “the clearest thinker he knew” was the comic creator I’d come to realize was one of the worst specimens of human filth I’ve yet to encounter. This should have warned me. When I pointed out to him on a later occasion that the opinion of an old “master” was not that good on a certain subject, due to the fact that the old “master” had run a sweatshop, he became quite indignant. Alas. Another crazy motherfucker.

So I’ve decided to steer clear of these crazy motherfuckers. They run the gamut of spineless liberals to hateful Libertarian racists (one of them, oddly, penning a pro-Jewish tract—as a kind of suck-up, sleight of hand, classic misdirection I suspect). I think I’ve had quite my fill of these hateful bastards. I can only hope the world caves in on them. The fact that they're all pals and buddies no longer mystifies me at all.

Why I Hate Libertarians.

 Notation: I thought about altering this post of my blog for many reason, not least of which is that my view of the US version of Libertarians has changed somewhat. But to change or delete it would be dishonest, so I'm leaving it to stand. But I do want to mention that I no longer "hate" Libertarians. These days, I merely disagree with most of them when it comes to domestic policies. Frankly, I find myself agreeing with them on foreign policy quite often. In addition, I rather admire them more than I do liberals. Mainly because one thing about Libertarians is that they are honest. They say what they mean and they mean what they say. Which is exactly opposite of the average liberal, most of whom are excessively dishonest and don't seem to know their asses from holes in the ground.

So, be aware that I don't "hate" Libertarians. (Not that I ever actually hated them the way a person might hate the guy who beat and robbed him.) In the past it was just that I could find nothing among them with which I could agree when it came to Libertarian policies. This is--to put it mildly--no longer the case.

See my "Why Liberals Piss Me Off" for some more of my evolving points of view. (Also, just to make it clear---I rather think Ron Paul is about right when it comes to foreign policy.)




In my personal experience I have found Libertarians to be greedy, self-centered, totally self-interested assholes. Their motto can be summed up easily:

“I’ve got mine (or I soon will have), everyone else go fuck themselves.”

You can count on a Libertarian to be relatively stupid, but at the same time think of himself as very far above the average in intelligence. In fact, though, Libertarians are stupid on a level that is almost singular for such a group. Which is why, I suppose, so many identify themselves as Libertarians—there’s certainly no shortage of stupid people in the USA.

Among the many negative things one can always count on a Libertarian to do is to come down on virtually every political and social and economic decision on the side of corporate interests and of the rich. In a truly twisted way, Libertarians are the modern equivalent of the Victorian era royalists. In those days, it was supposed that there must be a reason for everything. That said, then there was certainly a good reason why the masses were ruled over by royalty. The reason being that royalty were put in their positions by divine intervention, so it must therefore be a very good thing. Our modern-day version of the royalists are Libertarians. There must be a good reason why the rich are rich, and that reason being—in a nutshell—that the rich “deserve” to be rich; the reason generally given as by virtue of hard work or quick wit (a Darwinian reason, if you will). Therefore, leave them alone and allow them to continue to be rich and to gather about them still more riches. For the sake of all that is worthwhile (I would have said “God”, but Libertarians by and large claim not to believe in “God”), don’t regulate the rich and the corporations they own and control, for to do so would be to interfere with the natural right of the rich to be rich.

Libertarians are so fucking stupid. The only thing at which they are good is in knowing the hand that feeds them. Some Libertarians—such as a certain mildly talented comic book artist—find themselves growing richer the more they kiss the asses of those at the top. By praising the rich and defending the rich and the status quo at every opportunity, they are rewarded in relation to how much they have done for the very rich that day.

In brief, Libertarians have about them the two traits that I find most loathsome in the human race: selfishness and stupidity. In the 1930s we would have found them rallying around such political filth as Benito Mussolini, Adolph Hitler, and Francisco Franco. Then, as now, they would justify their poisonous ideas and decisions as being the most logical. Just look to see what racist, nationalist bastards around whom they now gather for a look into the very diseased minds of these idiots.

Libertarians—what a bunch of stinking morons.

Libert-Aryans and Other Rude Surprises.

Sometimes I regret reading the personal views of creators whose work I admire. There are moments where one gets the nastiest surprises.

Take, for instance, Peter Bagge. For years I enjoyed everything he did, from Neat Stuff to The Bradleys to Hate. Funny stuff, and he’s one of the best cartoonists around (although why he insists he wasn’t influenced by John Stanley is beyond me). His toons are fun to look upon, generally humorous, and occasionally insightful.

Now, one of the many, many, many things in this world that I completely loathe are Libertarians. I freaking hate Libertarians. They truly and completely make me sick on my stomach. They are the same sort who would have been brownshirts in the 1930s. Republicans who like to smoke dope, one of my friends calls them. I wish they’d all fall over dead.

One day I was sitting in an office (I forget where—might have been for a medical checkup or something) and I noticed a copy of the right wing extremist Libertarian rag, REASON. Normally I wouldn’t give such a monstrous publication a second look, but either Bagge’s name was on the cover, or it was open and I noticed Peter Bagge’s name. Something made me pick up the lousy damned thing.

I opened it and saw that there was a cartoon in it by Peter Bagge. What’s this? I wondered. Have these fascistic bastards commissioned a piece by Bagge? I read the ridiculous bit of neo-Nazi propaganda and realize that not only was it not commissioned, it was a heartfelt piece by Bagge himself. Later, at home, I got in touch with some friends and learned that Bagge is a regular contributor to the Libertarian/Fascist magazine! He actually believes in that shit! GOOD GOD!!!

Now, I didn’t go about tossing out my collection of Peter Bagge graphic novels and such, but I did go through them and reread the stuff. And I realized that, specifically, the selfish bastard Buddy Bradley was not some concocted creation, but Bagge’s cartoon persona. And I realized that the golden, blessed fairy tale world in which Buddy lived was not God out of the Machine, but the twisted view of the world as envisioned by Bagge! Or, perhaps, the charmed life that Bagge was himself living—a cartoon analog of his own real world movements through the comic book industry.

At any rate, I realized that I’d have been much happier never having known that Peter Bagge is the modern equivalent of one of Mussolini’s pals. I’m sure I’ll still laugh at Bagge’s stories, but there will always be that germ of understanding that it springs from a mind infected by a truly diseased system of beliefs.

There have been other such incidents, of course. When I discovered that Steve Ditko, creator of The Amazing Spider-Man and Dr. Strange, was a follower of that monstrous whore, Ayn Rand, I was disappointed, but still went about searching out his crazed comic book manifestos. It made it easier to understand why he walked away from his gig at Marvel Comics, and also made the underlying themes of Peter Parker’s sense of personal responsibility during the years the book was written by Mr. Ditko. I really missed the overpowering angst that left that comic with the departure of its one true creator.

But it didn’t make understanding that one of my favorite comic book creators was a right wing nutcase any easier.

There have been a number of other such cases throughout the years. For some reason, SF writers tend to be pro-corporate stooges. Imagine my discomfort upon learning that many of my favorite sf writers are just a notch or two this side Uncle Adolf. Alas!

Ah, well. We can’t live closed off in a bubble. I’ll continue to read the stuff that appeals to me, and I’m sure I’ll continue to discover the unsavory belief systems of many of the folk who write and draw and direct the things that help me to while away my leisure time.